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Eleider Alvarez Knew When to Go to the ‘McIntosh’ to Shock Kovalev

ATLANTIC CITY, N.J. – Until late Saturday night, most people probably knew McIntosh as the Binghampton, N.Y.-based manufacturer of high-end audio equipment. After underdog Eleider Alvarez’s no-doubt-about-it, seventh-round knockout of WBO light heavyweight champion Sergey Kovalev, however, it might also stand for the concussive sound of punches to the jaw, as loud and unmistakable as the riffs of the late, great Keith Moon, the wild ’n’ crazy drummer who helped make The Who one of the best rock bands ever to take the stage.
References to musicians, like Moon, who flashed across the night sky like comets and then vanished into the memories of their fans seem especially appropriate given the venue for Kovalev-Alvarez, the first fight card held at the newly refurbished Hard Rock Hotel & Casino, the former Trump Taj Mahal which shone like a diamond after a $500 million transformation. Gone are the massive chandeliers and India-themed accoutrements that marked its previous incarnation; in are electric guitars and drum kits used by a phalanx of Grammy Award winners who topped the charts for however long they were able to keep their sound fresh and in demand, and their bodies capable of holding up to the demands of a relentless, wearying lifestyle.
After he was sent crashing to the canvas three times in that fateful seventh round, the possibility now appears to be very real that the 35-year-old Kovalev (32-3-1, 28 KOs) may have run out of the kind of smash hits he used to deliver instead of taking. The “Krusher” from Russia now has lost three of his five most recent bouts, including stoppages by Andre Ward and Alvarez, a career slump marked by an alarming tendency to lose energy and power into the middle rounds.
“I think Sergey tends to run out of gas after six rounds,” said Main Events CEO Kathy Duva, Kovalev’s promoter. “That seemed to be the magic round with Ward, too. He did great for six rounds and then faltered. I assume he got tired.”
Although Kovalev has a rematch clause that he and his support team could enforce sooner rather than later, Duva hinted that their guy might be better served to take some time off to consider his options. That could open the door for Colombia-born, Montreal-based Alvarez – finally a star, if only temporarily – to proceed to a unification showdown with another Russian, Dmitry Bivol (14-0, 11 KOs), who retained his WBA 175-pound title with a workmanlike unanimous decision over Isaac Chilemba (25-6-2, 10 KOs) in the first half of the HBO-televised doubleheader. Other holders of alphabet light heavyweight straps are the WBC’s Adonis Stevenson (29-1-1, 24 KOs) and still another Russian, the IBF’s Artur Beterbiev (12-0, 12 KOs).
For his part, Bivol expressed disappointment that countryman Kovalev, a 1-to-6 favorite in Atlantic City’s newly opened sports books, had lost, and not just for reasons of nationalistic pride.
“My team had negotiations regarding Kovalev being my next fight, to unify the championship,” Bivol noted. “Sergey was a great champion. It’s unfortunate that he lost the title, but I would want the same opportunity to have a unification in December as discussed. If it’s Alvarez, I would be happy to fight Alvarez.”
Alvarez also would be happy to fight someone, anyone, for a unified title, although he doesn’t expect it to be Stevenson, for whom he somehow was the mandatory challenger for three years without ever getting a shot at the brass ring. It’s no wonder he and his advisers fairly jumped at the chance to get it on with Kovalev, who, if what they say is to be believed, appeared to be increasingly vulnerable for the same reasons that had worried Duva.
“We saw a couple of things, not only in the Ward fights but in other Kovalev fights,” said Alvarez’s trainer, Marc Ramsay. “We knew at the beginning of the fight that Kovalev was going to be dangerous. But we were ready to let some rounds go because our game plan was to bring Kovalev into the second part of the fight and go a little more physically with him. It worked.”
Through the mid-point of the scheduled 12-rounder, the Alvarez plan – the key component of which was the strategic deployment of a combination Ramsay had dubbed “the McIntosh” – probably seemed successful only in the minds of fighter and trainer. Kovalev was up on all three official scorecards, 59-55 on those submitted by Joseph Pasquale and Lynne Carter and 58-56 on Carlos Ortiz Jr.’s, and he had a big round in the fourth, when he landed 25 of 60 non-jabs (power punches) according to CompuBox. But, as Ramsay had anticipated, even then Kovalev’s vaunted arsenal was being downgraded to small-arms fire.
“I knew it would be a tough fight, and it was a tough fight,” Alvarez said. “But the game plan was working exactly as we wanted it to. After the sixth round, Marc told me to fight Kovalev on the inside. He saw that Kovalev didn’t have the same power as in the beginning of the fight. I threw a certain combination we call `the McIntosh’ and that was the end of the fight.
According to Ramsay, the so-called McIntosh is not really a secret, previously unused weapon he had Alvarez pull out of his trick bag. “The `McIntosh’ comes from a fight where Eleider knocked (he didn’t specify the opponent) out a couple of years ago,” he said. “it’s a jab to the body and a right hand over the top.”
So why “McIntosh”? Why not “Apple” or “Microsoft”?
“If I say `McIntosh,’ the other guy has no idea what I’m talking about,” Ramsay explained.
In the corner prior to round seven, Ramsay told Alvarez to put the full Mac on a presumably wilting Kovalev, who had fired most of his remaining bullets in the fourth round that hadn’t resulted in the knockout he so clearly was seeking.
“I tried it a lot, but I told Marc I needed one more time,” Alvarez said of the combo that will be the talk of boxing until, well, it isn’t. “I wanted to knock him out (after the first knockdown, which clearly had deposited Kovalev into the danger zone) because he might be too tough afterward. I knew that he was hurt and I went for the kill.”
Referee David Fields would have been justified had he waved the fight off after Kovalev went down a second time, arising on legs as shaky as those of a newborn fawn, but he allowed the champion one more opportunity to fight his way out of deepening trouble. Alvarez did not let him off the hook, once more McIntoshing Kovalev into a horizontal plane as emphatically as possible. The end came after an elapsed time of 2 minutes, 45 seconds.
Should Kovalev have reached the end of his heady run as a top 10 pound-for-pound kind of fighter, the more compelling question might be whether Alvarez is ready to try on his vanquished foe’s shoes to see if they’re a comfortable fit. He wouldn’t be the first fighter of fairly recent vintage to become an overnight sensation; think Thailand’s Srisasket Sor Rungvisai, the junior bantamweight who burst into instant prominence as the result of back-to-back victories over Roman “Chocolatito” Gonzalez. For those who care to reach further back in history, remember that James Toney was a 20-1 underdog and was far behind on points when he dethroned IBF middleweight champion James Toney with the sort of late explosion that Alvarez laid on Kovalev. But for every fighter who legitimizes himself with the sort of exclamation-point victory that Alvarez is now enjoying, there are others who rose to the occasion and just as quickly slipped from prominence.
“It was a great performance by Eleider. Tonight a star was born,” said Yvon Michel, who promotes Alvarez. “I said beforehand that after this fight, you all will know who Eleider is.
“We always said the fight will be decided the way that Eleider laid the trap for the punches that would ensnare Kovalev.”
So salute “The McIntosh,” the fight game’s flavor of the moment. Salute, too, the 34-year-old Alvarez, who waited and waited for a chance to demonstrate to the world that he really is what he always has claimed to be, which is a fighter whose light too long has been hidden under a basket of anonymity.
Also deserving of plaudits are the Hard Rock, which sold all 5,600 of its seats in the Etess Arena in a glorious return not only to the venue, but to Atlantic City, which might soon be enjoying its own rebirth as a destination fight town after long years of neglect.
“We’re back,” a saddened Duva said, looking for positives in a night that didn’t have many for Team Kovalev. “The city’s back. From that aspect we had a wonderful night.”
Check out more boxing news on video at The Boxing Channel
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“Breadman” Edwards: An Unlikely Boxing Coach with a Panoramic View of the Sport

Stephen “Breadman” Edwards’ first fighter won a world title. That may be some sort of record.
It’s true. Edwards had never trained a fighter, amateur or pro, before taking on professional novice Julian “J Rock” Williams. On May 11, 2019, Williams wrested the IBF 154-pound world title from Jarrett Hurd. The bout, a lusty skirmish, was in Fairfax, Virginia, near Hurd’s hometown in Maryland, and the previously undefeated Hurd had the crowd in his corner.
In boxing, Stephen Edwards wears two hats. He has a growing reputation as a boxing coach, a hat he will wear on Saturday, May 31, at Mandalay Bay in Las Vegas when the two fighters that he currently trains, super middleweight Caleb Plant and middleweight Kyrone Davis, display their wares on a show that will air on Amazon Prime Video. Plant, who needs no introduction, figures to have little trouble with his foe in a match conceived as an appetizer to a showdown with Jermall Charlo. Davis, coming off his career-best win, an upset of previously undefeated Elijah Garcia, is in tough against fast-rising Cuban prospect Yoenli Hernandez, a former world amateur champion.
Edwards’ other hat is that of a journalist. His byline appears at “Boxing Scene” in a column where he answers questions from readers.
It’s an eclectic bag of questions that Breadman addresses, ranging from his thoughts on an upcoming fight to his thoughts on one of the legendary prizefighters of olden days. Boxing fans, more so than fans of any other sport, enjoy hashing over fantasy fights between great fighters of different eras. Breadman is very good at this, which isn’t to suggest that his opinions are gospel, merely that he always has something provocative to add to the discourse. Like all good historians, he recognizes that the best history is revisionist history.
“Fighters are constantly mislabled,” he says. “Everyone talks about Joe Louis’s right hand. But if you study him you see that his left hook is every bit as good as his right hand and it’s more sneaky in terms of shock value when it lands.”
Stephen “Breadman” Edwards was born and raised in Philadelphia. His father died when he was three. His maternal grandfather, a Korean War veteran, filled the void. The man was a big boxing fan and the two would watch the fights together on the family television.
Edwards’ nickname dates to his early teen years when he was one of the best basketball players in his neighborhood. The derivation is the 1975 movie “Cornbread, Earl and Me,” starring Laurence Fishburne in his big screen debut. Future NBA All-Star Jamaal Wilkes, fresh out of UCLA, plays Cornbread, a standout high school basketball player who is mistakenly murdered by the police.
Coming out of high school, Breadman had to choose between an academic scholarship at Temple or an athletic scholarship at nearby Lincoln University. He chose the former, intending to major in criminal justice, but didn’t stay in college long. What followed were a succession of jobs including a stint as a city bus driver. To stay fit, he took to working out at the James Shuler Memorial Gym where he sparred with some of the regulars, but he never boxed competitively.
Over the years, Philadelphia has harbored some great boxing coaches. Among those of recent vintage, the names George Benton, Bouie Fisher, Nazeem Richardson, and Bozy Ennis come quickly to mind. Breadman names Richardson and West Coast trainer Virgil Hunter as the men that have influenced him the most.
We are all a product of our times, so it’s no surprise that the best decade of boxing, in Breadman’s estimation, was the 1980s. This was the era of the “Four Kings” with Sugar Ray Leonard arguably standing tallest.
Breadman was a big fan of Leonard and of Leonard’s three-time rival Roberto Duran. “I once purchased a DVD that had all of Roberto Duran’s title defenses on it,” says Edwards. “This was a back before the days of YouTube.”
But Edwards’ interest in the sport goes back much deeper than the 1980s. He recently weighed in on the “Pittsburgh Windmill” Harry Greb whose legend has grown in recent years to the point that some have come to place him above Sugar Ray Robinson on the list of the greatest of all time.
“Greb was a great fighter with a terrific resume, of that there is no doubt,” says Breadman, “but there is no video of him and no one alive ever saw him fight, so where does this train of thought come from?”
Edwards notes that in Harry Greb’s heyday, he wasn’t talked about in the papers as the best pound-for-pound fighter in the sport. The boxing writers were partial to Benny Leonard who drew comparisons to the venerated Joe Gans.
Among active fighters, Breadman reserves his highest praise for Terence Crawford. “Body punching is a lost art,” he once wrote. “[Crawford] is a great body puncher who starts his knockouts with body punches, but those punches are so subtle they are not fully appreciated.”
If the opening line holds up, Crawford will enter the ring as the underdog when he opposes Canelo Alvarez in September. Crawford, who will enter the ring a few weeks shy of his 38th birthday, is actually the older fighter, older than Canelo by almost three full years (it doesn’t seem that way since the Mexican redhead has been in the public eye so much longer), and will theoretically be rusty as 13 months will have elapsed since his most recent fight.
Breadman discounts those variables. “Terence is older,” he says, “but has less wear and tear and never looks rusty after a long layoff.” That Crawford will win he has no doubt, an opinion he tweaked after Canelo’s performance against William Scull: “Canelo’s legs are not the same. Bud may even stop him now.”
Edwards has been with Caleb Plant for Plant’s last three fights. Their first collaboration produced a Knockout of the Year candidate. With one ferocious left hook, Plant sent Anthony Dirrell to dreamland. What followed were a 12-round setback to David Benavidez and a ninth-round stoppage of Trevor McCumby.
Breadman keeps a hectic schedule. From Monday through Friday, he’s at the DLX Gym in Las Vegas coaching Caleb Plant and Kyrone Davis. On weekends, he’s back in Philadelphia, checking in on his investment properties and, of greater importance, watching his kids play sports. His 14-year-old daughter and 12-year-old son are standout all-around athletes.
On those long flights, he has plenty of time to turn on his laptop and stream old fights or perhaps work on his next article. That’s assuming he can stay awake.
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Arne’s Almanac: The Good, the Bad, and the (Mostly) Ugly; a Weekend Boxing Recap and More

Arne’s Almanac: The Good, the Bad, and the (Mostly) Ugly; a Weekend Boxing Recap and More
It’s old news now, but on back-to-back nights on the first weekend of May, there were three fights that finished in the top six snoozefests ever as measured by punch activity. That’s according to CompuBox which has been around for 40 years.
In Times Square, the boxing match between Devin Haney and Jose Carlos Ramirez had the fifth-fewest number of punches thrown, but the main event, Ryan Garcia vs. Rolly Romero, was even more of a snoozefest, landing in third place on this ignoble list.
Those standings would be revised the next night – knocked down a peg when Canelo Alvarez and William Scull combined to throw a historically low 445 punches in their match in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, 152 by the victorious Canelo who at least pressed the action, unlike Scull (pictured) whose effort reminded this reporter of “Cat on a Hot Tin Roof” – no, not the movie starring Paul Newman, just the title.
CompuBox numbers, it says here, are best understood as approximations, but no amount of rejiggering can alter the fact that these three fights were stinkers. Making matters worse, these were pay-per-views. If one had bundled the two events, rather than buying each separately, one would have been out $90 bucks.
****
Thankfully, the Sunday card on ESPN from Las Vegas was redemptive. It was just what the sport needed at this moment – entertaining fights to expunge some of the bad odor. In the main go, Naoya Inoue showed why he trails only Shohei Ohtani as the most revered athlete in Japan.
Throughout history, the baby-faced assassin has been a boxing promoter’s dream. It’s no coincidence that down through the ages the most common nickname for a fighter – and by an overwhelming margin — is “Kid.”
And that partly explains Naoya Inoue’s charisma. The guy is 32 years old, but here in America he could pass for 17.
Joey Archer
Joey Archer, who passed away last week at age 87 in Rensselaer, New York, was one of the last links to an era of boxing identified with the nationally televised Friday Night Fights at Madison Square Garden.

Joey Archer
Archer made his debut as an MSG headliner on Feb. 4, 1961, and had 12 more fights at the iconic mid-Manhattan sock palace over the next six years. The final two were world title fights with defending middleweight champion Emile Griffith.
Archer etched his name in the history books in November of 1965 in Pittsburgh where he won a comfortable 10-round decision over Sugar Ray Robinson, sending the greatest fighter of all time into retirement. (At age 45, Robinson was then far past his peak.)
Born and raised in the Bronx, Joey Archer was a cutie; a clever counter-puncher recognized for his defense and ultimately for his granite chin. His style was embedded in his DNA and reinforced by his mentors.
Early in his career, Archer was domiciled in Houston where he was handled by veteran trainer Bill Gore who was then working with world lightweight champion Joe Brown. Gore would ride into the Hall of Fame on the coattails of his most famous fighter, “Will-o’-the Wisp” Willie Pep. If Joey Archer had any thoughts of becoming a banger, Bill Gore would have disabused him of that notion.
In all honesty, Archer’s style would have been box office poison if he had been black. It helped immensely that he was a native New Yorker of Irish stock, albeit the Irish angle didn’t have as much pull as it had several decades earlier. But that observation may not be fair to Archer who was bypassed twice for world title fights after upsetting Hurricane Carter and Dick Tiger.
When he finally caught up with Emile Griffith, the former hat maker wasn’t quite the fighter he had been a few years earlier but Griffith, a two-time Fighter of the Year by The Ring magazine and the BWAA and a future first ballot Hall of Famer, was still a hard nut to crack.
Archer went 30 rounds with Griffith, losing two relatively tight decisions and then, although not quite 30 years old, called it quits. He finished 45-4 with 8 KOs and was reportedly never knocked down, yet alone stopped, while answering the bell for 365 rounds. In retirement, he ran two popular taverns with his older brother Jimmy Archer, a former boxer who was Joey’s trainer and manager late in Joey’s career.
May he rest in peace.
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Bombs Away in Las Vegas where Inoue and Espinoza Scored Smashing Triumphs

Japan’s Naoya “Monster” Inoue banged it out with Mexico’s Ramon Cardenas, survived an early knockdown and pounded out a stoppage win to retain the undisputed super bantamweight world championship on Sunday.
Japan and Mexico delivered for boxing fans again after American stars failed in back-to-back days.
“By watching tonight’s fight, everyone is well aware that I like to brawl,” Inoue said.
Inoue (30-0, 27 KOs), and Cardenas (26-2, 14 KOs) and his wicked left hook, showed the world and 8,474 fans at T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas that prizefighting is about punching, not running.
After massive exposure for three days of fights that began in New York City, then moved to Riyadh, Saudi Arabia and then to Nevada, it was the casino capital of the world that delivered what most boxing fans appreciate- pure unadulterated action fights.
Monster Inoue immediately went to work as soon as the opening bell rang with a consistent attack on Cardenas, who very few people knew anything about.
One thing promised by Cardenas’ trainer Joel Diaz was that his fighter “can crack.”
Cardenas proved his trainer’s words truthful when he caught Inoue after a short violent exchange with a short left hook and down went the Japanese champion on his back. The crowd was shocked to its toes.
“I was very surprised,” said Inoue about getting dropped. ““In the first round, I felt I had good distance. It got loose in the second round. From then on, I made sure to not take that punch again.”
Inoue had no trouble getting up, but he did have trouble avoiding some of Cardenas massive blows delivered with evil intentions. Though Inoue did not go down again, a look of total astonishment blanketed his face.
A real fight was happening.
Cardenas, who resembles actor Andy Garcia, was never overly aggressive but kept that left hook of his cocked and ready to launch whenever he saw the moment. There were many moments against the hyper-aggressive Inoue.
Both fighters pack power and both looked to find the right moment. But after Inoue was knocked down by the left hook counter, he discovered a way to eliminate that weapon from Cardenas. Still, the Texas-based fighter had a strong right too.
In the sixth round Inoue opened up with one of his lightning combinations responsible for 10 consecutive knockout wins. Cardenas backed against the ropes and Inoue blasted away with blow after blow. Then suddenly, Cardenas turned Inoue around and had him on the ropes as the Mexican fighter unloaded nasty combinations to the body and head. Fans roared their approval.
“I dreamed about fighting in front of thousands of people in Las Vegas,” said Cardenas. “So, I came to give everything.”
Inoue looked a little surprised and had a slight Mona Lisa grin across his face. In the seventh round, the Japanese four-division world champion seemed ready to attack again full force and launched into the round guns blazing. Cardenas tried to catch Inoue again with counter left hooks but Inoue’s combos rained like deadly hail. Four consecutive rights by Inoue blasted Cardenas almost through the ropes. The referee Tom Taylor ruled it a knockdown. Cardenas beat the count and survived the round.
In the eighth round Inoue looked eager to attack and at the bell launched across the ring and unloaded more blows on Cardenas. A barrage of 14 unanswered blows forced the referee to stop the fight at 45 seconds of round eight for a technical knockout win.
“I knew he was tough,” said Inoue. “Boxing is not that easy.”
Espinoza Wins
WBO featherweight titlist Rafael Espinosa (27-0, 23 KOs) uppercut his way to a knockout win over Edward Vazquez (17-3, 4 KOs) in the seventh round.
“I wanted to fight a game fighter to show what I am capable,” said Espinoza.
Espinosa used the leverage of his six-foot, one-inch height to slice uppercuts under the guard of Vazquez. And when the tall Mexican from Guadalajara targeted the body, it was then that the Texas fighter began to wilt. But he never surrendered.
Though he connected against Espinoza in every round, he was not able to slow down the taller fighter and that allowed the Mexican fighter to unleash a 10-punch barrage including four consecutive uppercuts. The referee stopped the fight at 1:47 of the seventh round.
It was Espinoza’s third title defense.
Photo credit: Mikey Williams / Top Rank
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